Kim MacDonald

Parents face daunting challenges when raising disabled children. And those challenges – which can range from 24-hour-a-day care to basic child rearing – can be magnified in a rural setting. “What keeps people safe is having people around,” said Vickie Cammack, of the Planned Lifetime Advocacy Network in British Columbia. She said families of physically […] Read more

Natives in Manitoba will soon capture elk for the provincial government and for their own use under the terms of a recent initiative between the government and the Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs. Under the agreement, First Nations people will capture up to 450 elk, a maximum of 150 per year for three years. They will […] Read more

First there was cyberspace. Then came cyberpets, little computerized toys that have to be fed, played with and cleaned up after. Now the newest movement in computer simulation is a cyberanimal – the animat. Animats are at the centre of an international study, part of it going on at the Prairie Swine Centre in Saskatoon, […] Read more

Parents face daunting challenges when raising disabled children. And those challenges – which can range from 24-hour-a-day care to basic child rearing – can be magnified in a rural setting. “What keeps people safe is having people around,” said Vickie Cammack of the Planned Lifetime Advocacy Network in British Columbia. She said families of physically […] Read more

Recent concerns in the United States about levels of heavy metals in fertilizers are not an issue in Canada because of government standards. The standards were implemented in 1980 to deal with sewage sludge. They were changed in 1993 to apply to other products in response to an earlier problem. “There was an incident in […] Read more

Mud from the bottom of prairie lakes may be the key to reducing crop insurance rates in the future. Two University of Regina professors will be studying lake sediments as a way of documenting prairie droughts for frequency, length and intensity during the past 800 years. It is hoped the results of the study will […] Read more

SASKATOON – The writing is on the wall at the University of Saskatchewan. One hundred and fifty-three agrologists now have their names inscribed on a Wall of Honor located on the second floor of the university’s College of Agriculture. The wall is the initiative of the Saskatchewan Institute of Agrologists, honoring those who have made […] Read more

Just because today’s farms are bigger, that doesn’t mean they’re better – at least when it comes to making money. The National Farmers Union used information from the Statistics Canada 1996 census to highlight that although producers farm more acres now, they aren’t much better off than their fathers and grandfathers. The NFU figures show […] Read more

Delving into somebody else’s stress can be a stressful experience. “You can’t be in the caring profession and not care enough to take calls home sometimes,” said a Saskatchewan farm stress line worker. “You think, ‘could I have handled that in a more efficient way?’ ” said Christine, who can only be identified by a […] Read more

Ask farm machinery dealers in Western Canada about labor, and they all say the same thing: Qualified mechanics and technicians are in short supply. “We’re having a heck of a time finding people,” said Scott Medd, general manager of Miller Farm Equipment in Shoal Lake, Man. “It’s hard to find a qualified parts person, but […] Read more